there's a part of me that kinda wishes they hadn't given her officer rank and put her in a uniform in the pilot episode in the first place. That was the mistake

Troi in a miniskirt is NEVER a mistake.

Pavonis wrote:

Lance wrote:

Of course, it would be hard to accentuate her importance in the ship's hierarchy without showing her rank...

But that's what they did for five seasons. Hell, when "Disaster" originally aired, I had forgotten Troi had a rank at all. I had completely forgotten she had been depicted as a Starfleet officer in the pilot, and had taken to thinking of her as a civilian psychiatrist/psychologist serving Starfleet, the way Guinan is a civilian serving drinks as a bartender.

Oh, I feel exactly the same way. For the longest time I actually used to think that it had been a conscious decision made by the production team after the pilot episode, to retcon her as a civilian. So it seemed weird to me too when "Disaster" reminded us of her technical rank of lieutenant commander, and then seasons six, seven and the movies seen her increasingly wearing uniform again instead of the leotards.